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Root Want more space for apps, what are my options?

C

cable_guy

Well-Known Member
hi all,

I have a rooted Desire with HBOOT 0.80 and I would like to install a non-sense ROM, but my biggest wish is to also have more room for apps than stock....

Do I need to S-OFF to do this? As I'm stuggling because of my 0.80 low version of HBOOT...(to go into detail, I'm struggling with the fact I can't find a RUU of Gingerbread to flash onto it, to upgrade the HBOOT)

Or is there another way without S-OFF please? I'm up for some work if necessary.

thanks in advance.
 
you can try apps2sd in the market. just search for it. there is a few of them and i cant find the one ive used in the past but hopefully this points you in the right direction :)
 
Hi Cable Guy

All the information you should need is in this thread:
http://androidforums.com/desire-all-things-root/220627-faq-apps2sd-updated-17-02-11-a.html

Essentially you have 2 options:

1 The least risky choice is to partition your sd card (recommend ext3 partition). You then need to flash a ROM which supports apps2sd+. The phone is fooled into thinking the ext partition is internal memory. Your apps will be downloaded there by default & all widgets will function as if on internal memory. Some ROMs will also move cache & dalvik cache to the partition.

2 If you s-off your phone you can flash a ROM which supports a smaller system partition & larger data partition which is slightly riskier.

You can also do both.

S-off is quite straight forward & gives many more options but you do need to know what you are doing to use those options. Returning to stock is also a little more involved.

Which ROM are you using currently & which would you like to use? Perhaps I could give some suggestions when I know what you want from a ROM.
 
nicka3200 said:
Hi Cable Guy

All the information you should need is in this thread:
http://androidforums.com/desire-all-things-root/220627-faq-apps2sd-updated-17-02-11-a.html

Essentially you have 2 options:

1 The least risky choice is to partition your sd card (recommend ext3 partition). You then need to flash a ROM which supports apps2sd+. The phone is fooled into thinking the ext partition is internal memory. Your apps will be downloaded there by default & all widgets will function as if on internal memory. Some ROMs will also move cache & dalvik cache to the partition.

2 If you s-off your phone you can flash a ROM which supports a smaller system partition & larger data partition which is slightly riskier.

You can also do both.

S-off is quite straight forward & gives many more options but you do need to know what you are doing to use those options. Returning to stock is also a little more involved.

Which ROM are you using currently & which would you like to use? Perhaps I could give some suggestions when I know what you want from a ROM.
Click to expand...

Hi,

thanks for the helpful post!

I am currently on LeeDroid 3.0.7, it's been ages since I flashed it but I'm itching to try a newer rom. I guess if I go for option 1) and don't S-OFF, that I can't try one of the ICS Roms?

Although for the short term, that would be fine, I firstly want to try a A2SD+ AOSP ROm which is fast and stable, possibly one with which I can iuse the AOSP ICS keyboard.
 
No you should be able to use an ics ROM without s-off. Have a read through the first few posts of your chosen ROMs thread at XDA. It should list any requirements.

If you want to try a gingerbread ROM Mildwilds ROMs are very good.
 
Yes you can use it. Partition your sd card with an ext 3 partition as per the guide in my previous post. Remember to back up the card first as partitioning will probably wipe it.

Next download & install the ROM.

Then download terminal emulator from the play store & type the commands exactly as listed in the XDA thread.
 
nicka3200 said:
Yes you can use it. Partition your sd card with an ext 3 partition as per the guide in my previous post. Remember to back up the card first as partitioning will probably wipe it.

Next download & install the ROM.

Then download terminal emulator from the play store & type the commands exactly as listed in the XDA thread.
Click to expand...

Thanks! I'm fairly excited about basically having a new phone later today!, do you recommend to format all 4GB of my card as EXT3?
 
No because then there won't be any space for music, photos etc. 1gb of ext3 should be enough & the rest fat32. You currently have all fat32.
 
OK great thanks! I think i'm almost ready.....but one more question - is Clockwork Mod still OK to flash with? I see things posted about another recovery program.....I've never used this, only CWM
 
nicka3200 said:
There's nothing wrong with clockwork mod. 4EXT recovery has some new features but you can't install it unless you are s-off.
Click to expand...

Just checked with Gparted and I've actually got an EXT3 partition, albeit just 512MB. Can I ask :

1) Can I assume if I steal some FAT32 and assign it to EXT3, I will get more space for apps on my current ROM?

2) Is it safer to buy a new SD card ( I think I want a > Class 6 one anyway ) and format that, then flash a new ROM using that card, and if it fails just put my old card in and nandroid restore the last known working ROM?

Thanks ever so much for this help so far, it's greatly appreciated!
 
1) Yes

2) Yes probably

Why not try it with the sd you have & your current partition? Anything you do with that card you can do with another. If you do go down that route though take a nandroid on your old sd then copy it to your new one in case you need it.
 
you're right I will try it with my current card.

My only worry now is whether Clockwork mod 2.5.0.7 is up to the task of flashing such a modern ROM
 
you're of course right :-)

BTW I took a look at the Mildwild rom MildWild MW-9, as you suggested.

WOW :o it looks amazing!

Mind me askign what class card you find best in a Desire? I heard there was an upper limit of Class 6, tempted to treat mine to a Sandisk Ultra Class 6
 
hi mate, just thought I'd let you know that I sucessfully grew my EXT3 partition to 1GB and flashed mildwild, it went on easily, and I wanted to thank you for your help - :D :smokingsomb:

MildWild is very nice indeed so far, it says I have 130Mb internal storage and not closer to a GB but I guess A2SD masquerades some of this to the end user.
 
I'm very pleased you're enjoying your revitalised phone.

Download Titanium back up if you don't already have it. It will tell you how much of your ext partition is being used.

Even when you have apps2sd+ on an external partition app data will still be on internal memory so internal space will still reduce. There are a number of ways around this but don't worry about it unless space becomes an issue.
 
Sorry to bump this but my phone started going really slowly, icons taking ages to render and the gallery lagging on startup etc, so I want to revisit to see if my A2SD+ is really working.

In Titanium backup It is showing

System ROM: 262MB (156MB free)
Internal: 154MB (29.2MB free)
SD Card: 2.86GB (1.20GB free)
SD Card (a2sd): 1GB (577MB free)
 
Yes that looks like it's working.

The gallery app is on the internal system partition (ROM) & the actual photos will be on the fat32 sd partition, ie none on the ext partition.
 
Thank you. If I was going to try a fresh SD card out of the packet, would I need to do anything apart from partition it correctly and plop it in my phone?
 
If you are using a2sd with an ext partition already, the procedure for changing to a new card is:

* While using the old card, take a nandroid backup.

* Then copy the complete contents of the old card's fat32 partition to a computer. Make sure you include any "hidden" files or folders, such as ".android_secure".

* Partition the new card. Copy the old card's data onto the fat32 partition of the new card.

* Boot into recovery and restore the nandroid you made in the first step.

Your computer cannot see the ext partition on the SD card, so you can't copy the apps from there. But the nandroid makes a backup of sd-ext, so you then copy the nandroid to the new card and restore it, and this reloads the sd-ext of the new card.

BTW, if you are having performance or stability problems, have you tried just going into recovery and wiping the dalvik cache? It may make no difference, but that will force the phone to rebuild it cleanly when you reboot, which can help with some problems.
 
Thanks for the procedure! very kind of you.

I haven't tried just wiping the cache, but thanks for the suggestion. I never thought about doing that outside of trying a new rom, when I do it before and after flashing.

The main reason I sparked up was because I wanted to dabble in a new ROM (and upgrade my Class 2 day one card) but am very unsure of the partition requirements for these new ones e.g. jelly bean etc.. I achieved S-OFF this morning to try to make my life easier but I have to admit I'm not 100% sure whether the ROMs I'm interested in will modify the internal memory partitions to achieve their install or not.
 
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